[BLOG] Some Sunday links

[rfmcdonald]

• Bad Astronomer Phil Plait suggests that strange markings in the upper atmosphere of Venus might well be evidence of life in that relatively Earth-like environment.


• The Broadside Blog's Caitlin Kelly raves over Babylon Berlin.


• Centauri Dreams considers, fifty years after its publication, Clarke's 2001.


• Crooked Timber considers Kevin Williamson in the context of conservative intellectual representation more generally.


• D-Brief considers "digisexuality", the fusion of the digital world with sexuality. (I think we're quite some way off, myself.)


• The Dragon's Tales considers evidence suggesting that the agricultural revolution in ancient Anatolia was achieved without population replacement from the Fertile Crescent.


• Drew Ex Machina takes a look at the flight of Apollo 6, a flight that helped iron out problem with the Saturn V.


• The Frailest Thing's Michael Sacasas is not impressed by the idea of the trolley problem, as something that allows for the displacement of responsibility.


• Gizmodo explains why the faces of Neanderthals were so different from the faces of modern humans.


• JSTOR Daily considers if volcano-driven climate change helped the rise of Christianity.


• Language Log considers, after Spinoza, the idea that vowels are the souls of consonants.


• Lawyers, Guns and Money engages in a bit of speculation: What would have happened had Clinton won? (Ideological gridlock, perhaps.)


• Lovesick Cyborg explores how the advent of the cheap USB memory stick allowed North Koreans to start to enjoy K-Pop.


• Russell Darnley considers the transformation of the forests of Indonesia's Riau forest from closed canopy forest to plantations.


• The Map Room Blog shares some praise of inset maps.


• Neuroskeptic considers how ketamine may work as an anti-depressant.


• The NYR Daily considers student of death, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross.


• Justin Petrone of north! shares an anecdote from the Long Island coastal community of Greenport.


• Personal Reflection's Jim Belshaw considers the iconic Benjamin Wolfe painting The Death of General Wolfe.


• The Planetary Society Blog's Casey Dreier notes cost overruns for the James Webb Space Telescope.


• pollotenchegg maps recent trends in natural increase and decrease in Ukraine.


• Roads and Kingdoms talks about a special Hverabrauð in Iceland, baked in hot springs.


• Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel shares his own proposal for a new Drake Equation, revised to take account of recent discoveries.


• Vintage Space considers how the American government would have responded if John Glenn had died in the course of his 1962 voyage into space.


• Window on Eurasia considers the belief among many Russians that had Beria, not Khrushchev, succeeded Stalin, the Soviet Union might have been more successful.